Zortch with 3D spatial sound 🎧 (OpenAL Soft HRTF audio)

Channel:

I Drink Lava - 3D Game Audio

Subscribers:

2,009

Published on June 10, 2023 3:41:20 AM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR531dKT_Ls

Game:

The Spatials (2015)

Duration: 14:28

589 views

20

USE HEADPHONES ONLY with any virtual surround like Windows Sonic turned off. Best HRTF effects at 1:20, 3:21, 3:35, 6:49, and 10:05.

This is Zortch, a new indie throwback shooter with OpenAL Soft's HRTF [IRC_1037 tables]. I was alerted to the presence of this title on my Discord server, and I must say it's a real pleasant surprise. After the initial "boomer shooter" renaissance in 2017, the sub-genre quickly became oversaturated with mediocre, linear arena shooters and Early Access scams. Zortch, though? Zortch is the real deal.

I'm talking Windows XP-compatible, here.

While I haven't played very far into it yet, Zortch scratches that "XTREME" retail Total Conversion mod itch like nothing else. I've covered some of these games in the past like "HacX", "Malice", and "Shrak". It's just a really bizarre and unique niche that the little "zoomer boomers" aren't fully aware of (because Civvie 11 hasn't reviewed them yet). The best part? It's only $5! Yeah, you get a full 15 level game on a custom-built, XP-compatible engine! None of that $25 perpetual Realms Deep demo crap.

While it would've been funny for this game to use the deprecated DirectSound3D engine, I'm still grateful it supports OpenAL. The positional audio is actually not that great, it's even worse than in FTE Quake. There actually seem to be two notable flaws:
1. Some sounds like enemy machine gun fire are way too loud and don't spatialize properly, possibly because of stereo .wavs? Haven't extracted the files yet.
2. Certain enemy sounds are spatialized only in the rear-left of the listener, which you can hear with the buzzsaw enemies right at the end.

Still, it's a hidden gem of an indie FPS and it supports binaural audio to boot. I really, really can't complain.


HRTF grade:
B-

Settings:
Windows Control Panel: Stereo

IRC_1037 HRTF tables placed in %APPDATA%/OpenAL/HRTF
(in alsoft.ini located in %APPDATA%)
channels=stereo
frequency=48000
sources=512
stereo-mode=headphones
cf_level=0
sample-type=float32
periods=2
period_size=128
output-limiter=false
default-hrtf=irc_1037_48000
hrtf=true
resampler=cubic
hrtf-mode=full
hrtf-size=0
drivers="-dsound,"

Links:
http://kcat.strangesoft.net/openal.html
http://recherche.ircam.fr/equipes/salles/listen/

Credits:
Logo is copyrighted by mutantleg. Use of this logo falls under fair use laws.

#boomershooter #retroshooter #3dsound #spatialaudio #binaural #3daudio #360audio #8daudio #hrtf #headphones #audiophile #gameaudio #mod #indie #indiegaming
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